UNSC Heart of Courage (CA-740)
The UNSC Heart of Courage was a Halcyon-class Heavy Cruiser Refit. She was launched from the Reyes-McLees Shipyards at NS Cubi Station, Reach on the 11th of November 2510. She was one of the longest serving Halcyon class vessels and saw extensive combat during the UNSC-Covenant war. Initially underpowered and poorly-armed like other Halcyon class cruisers, subsequent refits and repairs caused her to be one of the most powerful, yet underated vessels in the UNSC. She had been continously forced to upgrade throughout her operational life, with destroyed components swapped out with newer and hi-tech replacements, simply because newer parts were easier to obtain and cheaper to adapt to her old frame, than having to obtain working parts specifically for her class. Examples of this include the twin MAC guns and armor plating, taken directly from the Marathon-class cruiser production run. The sensor suite and Com package was taken from an electonic warfare Prowler, simply because there was nothing else available at the time. The patchwork systems provided versatility, the heavy weaponry provided firepower and bolted on excess armor combined with the continously rebuilt internal structure made her incredibly resilient, resulted in her being a phenomenal Heavy Cruiser in all aspects, apart from name and prestige. She was considered to be a very unlucky ship to serve aboard, with crew assigned to her often taking demotions to avoid serving aboard. She would invariably end up in the thick of battle and end up badly damaged with severe losses in crew, however this was more likely a reflection on the reckless and hard-charging command style of her first two Captains, RDML Stedall and RDML Peterson. Both of whom were extremely capable commanders, but the imagined shame of having been placed in command of a seemingly inferior cruiser, caused them to push the ship and crew in a quest to prove themselves to the admiralty and climb the ranks. Battle damage caused her to be almost completely rebuilt 9 times, as Command found it both cheap and neccessary to rebuild and repair her and then throw her at the Covenant as a delaying tactic rather than to have her decommissioned, leading to her nickname "The HOC", a play on both her name and "Ad Hoc", because of all the repairs and patches done to keep the ship operational. Other nicknames included "The Fleet's punching bag","Flying Scrap-yard" and "The Reach School of Engineering and Repairs". Despite the overwhelming negative reputation she gathered, she participated with distinction from the Retaking of Harvest right through to the Battle of Jericho VII in 2535, where RDML Stedall was killed and the HOC was forced to retreat barely operational with loss of 84% of her crew. She scarcely made it to Reach, where she was rebuilt again, and on behest of her new commander RDML Peterson, Marathon-class MAC cannons were added, missle capacity was radically increased and the newest in fire control systems was added. As a side note, the original fire control system was never removed, and could in an emergency be used to fire the newly added weapons, further adding to the ship's resilience. In fact the Admiral refused to take command of the vessel if these changes were not performed, having been passed over for command of a Marathon-Class cruiser. His years of service, knowledge and his threat to reveal details of certain "rumoured" operations, caused High Command to cave to the Admiral's demands and the Heart of Courage was significantly upgraded to his exacting specifications. It was also in this time, that RDML Peterson selected a new first officer, CPT Booyens. The man who would eventually succeed him. Booyens was a high level tactitian and had officially served in ONI as tactical advisor and analyst, though it was long rumoured that he was a Prowler Captain. His file was completely redacted and he never spoke about it, so it remained rumour. However his experience was evidenced by his effectiveness during combat, authority with which he handled the leadership role and also him being personally recommended for the post by Admiral Preston Cole, in Cole's own words " a paragon of outstanding conduct and supreme effectiveness as an officer...". The laconic and stoic, Booyens was also the perfect counterpoint to the aggressive, direct and sometimes explosive Peterson, advocating more thoughtful, subtle and cunning uses of "The HOC", in addition to handling the on-board discipline and administration - Roles Peterson did not care for. His ability in convincing the Admiral to make choices that would limit crew casualties and his fair conduct to all ranks, made him a firm favourite with the crew. In equal measure, his sometimes downright ruthless actions and spot-on tactical assesments made him a favourite of the Admiral and criticism of the ship started to die down to hushed whispers. RDML Peterson, also recruited some of the brightest officers and enlisted personel and improved the standing and combat effectiveness of the ship in leaps and bounds. Under RDML Peterson's tenure as captain of The HOC, the ship started to gather an impressive kill count in Covenant vessels, and despite taking insane beatings, it continued to return from patrols and battles. Only to be repaired, patched and sent out again. It participated in the Battle of Psi Serpentis accounting for a significant number of kills, before being forced to retreat due to Admiral Cole's orders and critical damage to the reactor and superstructure. During the retreat, the HOC moved to pick up escape pods and survivors. During fighting retreat, the bridge was directly hit by a Plasma torpedo, killing most of the command crew including RDML Peterson. CPT Booyens was severely injured and despite this, kept the ship fighting and only retreated when all pods had been brought aboard. The HOC started through the Cole-protocol required slipspace jumps and set a return course for Reach. Realising that his injuries were severe and the very limited time he would be able to command, he initiated emergency command overrides - essentially transferring control of the ship to the ship AI, Greymalkin, for the voyage home. It was at this time that, Lt.CMDR Mitchell, an officer picked up from an UNSC Agincourt escape pod, was ordered to report to the bridge. Only to be informed that she was being promoted to the Heart of Courage's Executive Officer, and field promoted to Commander, the Captain well aware of her record and made aware of her presence on board due to her neural command uplink. As a top student at the LUNA OCS academy, she had come to his attention some time prior, and had been on the short list for the HOC's new tactical officer. She was introduced to the ship AI and was handed a data storage unit from the wounded CPT Booyens. With standing order that if ONI or Command where to give her any trouble or contradict his list of orders to her, she was to simply say "Operation Odysseus" - to which he smirked, would either to make them back down or soil themselves. Failing that, to simply speak her service number into the unit, which would cause the encripted contents to be uploaded to every news service in the colonies. Which he assured her, they wouldn't allow to happen. She was ordered to take command, take care of the wounded and get the HOC to Reach, repaired and waiting for his return. With this, CPT Booyens slumped forward in his chair, his internal injuries and bleeding had caught up with him and the adrenaline had taken him only so far. He was rushed to the medical facilities and despite the trauma surgeons best efforts, his survival was by no means certain. With the HOC still 2 weeks travel from Reach, the now CMDR Mitchell, requested immediate assistance for the high number of casualties aboard, many survivors from the other ships at Psi Serpentis. The UNSC Hopeful and its escorting battlegroup, lead by the UNSC Stalingrad was dispatched and docked with the crippled cruiser in the Prycon system. It started dealing with 1000 plus wounded personel on board. The cruiser was given a two destroyer escort and slowly made its way back to the orbiting shipyards above Reach. By the time it had arrived, the shock of Admiral Cole's death had subsided and the HOC received a very subdued reception. With ONI, deliberately shaping the story altering the amount of wounded and the condition of the ship in the news, to regain morale in the fleet. The HOC's repairs commenced as soon as she docked with Anchor 9, and command was transferred to RDML Gadd - whom oversaw yet another refit for the battered ship. When the Commander protested the replacement of the Captain with the Admiral, whom was at first violently dismissive - threatening a court martial for insubordination. When she stated "Operation Odysseus", the now pale and shocked admiral stated that he had no interest in maintaining the post and would only fill it until the return of CPT Booyens - as such she decided that further revelation was not neccesary and decided to let the matter be. CMDR Mitchell's rank was made official in a ceremony at FLEETCOM, with her Silver oak leaves presented to her by Admiral Parangosky personally - Whom snidely commended her on the wisdom in using the info given by CPT Booyens - stating that if she had however released the secret, the UNSC would have been effectively destoyed, the war lost and the Admiral would have personally "deactivated" the Commander in the Highland Mountains. The Admiral also noted that the Commander and her further career will be watched with great interest. The commander recalled later, that she was shaken and terrified beyond belief by this blunt and chilling admission and also being "watched" by the most dangerous person in the UNSC was sickenly unsettling. The ceremony also became a major press event due to the amount of decorations presented to the crew members of the HOC. It is still the largest amount of Purple heart medals, Bronze and Silver Stars awarded for a single vessel during a combat operation - most medals awarded for the rescue of battle survivors while under fire. With RDML Peterson awarded the Red Legion of Honour and The Medal of Honour, posthumously for ordering the rescue of the survivors while the ship was under heavy fire. The majority of the crew accepted their awards with bitter disgust, as the still hospitalised CPT Booyens had not been awarded any medal, decoration or even commendation for his brilliant fighting retreat, rescue of the wounded or his actions in getting the ship home, despite his severe wounds. This fact was also not lost on the other UNSC Officers, with his peers and even his detractors in agreement that this was a great disservice - Though under military protocol it couldn't be discussed in any official capacity - and became angry hushed whispers. The fact that his awards had been officially vetoed by the highest levels in UN Government also did not go unnoticed - With RDML Peterson's elder brother in the running for Chairman of the Security Council and was subsequently written off as blatant political maneuvering - with Chairman Peterson eventually winning his election to the post. However, the decision was undertaken by the security council to prevent further inspection into the Captain's file and operational history - had he been given the awards due, it would have unacceptably raised his profile within the UNSC. Knowing the true reason, the ever stoic Booyens kept silent, never speaking of the event again. The elder Peterson's election had been a convenient coincidence. The repairs to HOC progressed rapidly as the UNSC simply needed every warship in fight. With the already prodigious armour plating increased even further and drastic improvements made to the superstructure. Robert McLees recalled in later interviews how he visited CPT Booyens in New Alexandria hospital for discussions on improvements to the ship and the design of the now commonplace - Central Battle Control Centre. The Battle at Psi Serpentis had caused CPT Booyens to seriously question the bridge design of combat vessels - having been smashed against a bulkhead and computer panel during the explosive decompression of the bridge. Even with the auto-sealing protocol, the hit to the bridge killed 6 officers - 3 of whom were sucked out to space before the seal could activate. Another was cut in half when it did engage. The proposed design involved a bridge housed inside a heavily armoured Titanium-A secure room - complete with own powerplant and life support deep within the ship. The circular room had a total of 9 stations from which all systems on board the ship could be controlled, each individual station resembling a standalone cockpit with large multifunction touch display monitors and its operator securely strapped into a modified fighter plane chair. The 7 system stations were arranged in a semi-circle with the 2 command chairs in the centre and placed side by side and equipped with its own monitors and manual flight controls. In this configuration all stations and terminals were visible to the Captain and First Officer. The size of the bridge was also reduced - to present a smaller target and to make communication during battle between bridge crew seamless and efficient. In this configuration the ship would be remain combat effective as long as it had weapons to fire and the bridge was still intact. With most if not all control systems duplicated or even triplicated. The HOC had spent almost 14 months in repairs before it was re-launched, now with command transferred back to CPT Booyens. As such it had missed the Battle of Miridem and escort operations during Operation Torpedo. It did participate in the Battle of Skopje, once again accounting for a significant amount of covenant vessel kills. It also participated during the Siege of Paris IV, effectively leading a deep flank maneuver to temporarily break the covenant blockade and allowing for major evacuation operations from the planet. She once again took heavy damage in the retreat, but her stand allowed civilian vessels to flee the system and discouraged Covenant pursuit. Her next mission was deemed classified due to the involvement of the SPARTAN-III NOBLE-fireteam. The HOC with her escort group engaged the numerically superior covenant fleet in a delaying action. This was likely only a diversionary tactic to keep the attention off NOBLE team. Details remain sketchy to this day - but focused on the destruction of a CSS Class battlecruiser containing a Covenant excavation teams - Unknown Artifacts had been retrieved and as they were in covenant hands had to be destroyed. During their operation Sierra THOM-293 achieved mission objective, but did not return to the HOC. No further details are available. The HOC had kept fighting until mid-2552 increasing her amount of Covenant ship kills even further, before being recalled to Reach. Specifically for Operation: Red Flag - the operation to capture the Covenant leadership. She was discounted from the operation by Cortana, as she had been rebuilt so many times and was so far from the original Halcyon that a refit to the specifications fitting the mission would be prohibitively expensive, overly time consuming and would take this highly effective ship of the line, when she was needed most. Furthermore, given CPT Keyes longer relation to the SPARTAN II project, it was decided to go with the Pillar of Autumn, which was a "newer" vessel as she had not been continiously rebuilt and was in most respects still standard. This eased the upgrade to RED FLAG Mission specs of being specifically geared to disable a covenant vessel. Though the final decision was only made on the 25th August 2552. The HOC had been dispatched on the 16th of July 2552 to investigate the disappearance of civilian freighters on the Inner colonies run, with Insurrection involvement suspected. However, she finds herself in the middle of a large Covenant contingent, making contact with the Fleet of Particular Justice on August 11th 2552. The location of the fleet and its close proximity to the inner colonies is relayed to FLEETCOM - Stating that they could be at the inner colonies within days. The HOC learns that the Covenant are already on Reach. CPT Booyens and CMDR Mitchell exhaust every tactical option to escape the Covenant fleet, being followed by a dedicated hunter pursuit group of 20 vessels including faster Covenant destroyers. The Hear of Courage makes a series of blind jumps, leaving a field of Hornet Nuclear mines after each jump, knowing the Covenant will follow through their slipspace wake. Unknown amount of the Covenant hunter-killer battle group is destroyed or damaged, as the hunter group looses contact with the HOC. The HOC then makes best possible speed towards Reach. Reaching single jump distance, late on the 29th of August 2552. At this point, the battle is turning against the UNSC and ships were specifically ordered away from Reach and not assist, as military vessels had higher priority. As the HOC turns to make the jumps to Earth, it received distress signals from the large civilian fleet fleeing Reach. This ad hoc flotilla contained colony vessels, Yachts, freighters, cargo runners, passenger liners and every other possible space fairing ship and carried hundreds of thousands of refugees. This group had very little protection with only a few frigates to provide cover. With the routing defeat of the UNSC Navy and the destruction of the orbital platforms, the Covenant vessels were now free to pursue the fleeing refugees and were in fact gaining fast. He typed a encrypted message and thinking for a minute opened coms and announced his decision to the crew: "To All the Crew....This is the Captain, We have received distress calls from ships leaving Reach carrying civilians numbering in the hundreds of thousands - the covenant fleet is chasing and gaining on them....We have also received orders to return to nearest safe port immediately and not assist any stragglers.....I...I for the second time in my life cannot comply with the order given to me, so if you are unwilling or unable to follow me now, I do understand and will not hold it against you, nor will it go on your record...The frigate UNSC Aegis Fate is escorting the flotilla and has been ordered to pick up escape pods from our ship....This is open to any crew member who wishes to leave, do so now. It is not a shame to go and has been an honour and pleasure to serve with you all, Godspeed" CMDR Mitchell reported that not a single crew member had reported to the escape pods and all the crew were at their battle stations. CPT Booyens smiled and ordered the HOC to make best possible speed to the Civilian flotilla. The rest of the battle is compiled from eyewitness reports, as the wreckage of the HOC has still not been recovered and with it, the flight recorder. When compiling reports from refugees on the civilian flotilla and its escorts, almost all witnesses state they were mesmerized as they stared at the sight of the single Cruiser heading in the opposite direction to all the other ships. For even the briefest of moments they felt no terror of covenant, but inspiration from the Courage. The civilian ships warmed up their slipspace drives and one after another jumped away and for every ship jumping away, 4 covenant vessels seemingly took its place on the edge of the Horizon. With the HOC, between the two fleets. His challenge to Covenant caused them to ignore the civilian vessels - in a direct affront to Shangelli their honour "I am Captain Booyens, Commander of the UNSC Heart of Courage, I am an inheritor of the Forerunners - You are their discarded mistakes. I am a warrior born - You are the most honourless, spineless excuses for soldiers possible. You come like a foul wave...stinking, disgusting and polluted, crashing into us , screaming at Us to move....I say Go yourselves - YOU MOVE!!!" As one after the other Covenant ship entered the area, they were engaged by the HOC, with the ship firing one MAC round and a fraction of a second later, the second, sending the high velocity MAC round straight through the weakened shield causing a brilliant blue flash from where the covenant vessels used to be. People on the ships in the civilian fleet looked back on the lone Cruiser. Flashes from its MAC guns, impacts from plasma on its hull, streaks from launched missles and the tracers from the point defence guns lighting space like a silent fireworks display. With the ship occassionally in full view as its fired nukes detonated among the covenant vessels. The last ships to jump away reported that during the flashes of light you could look through large sections of the HOC, yet it was still fighting, with many covenant plasma charges passing through the holes in the superstructure. The UNSC Heart of Courage was declared lost with all hands on 30th August 2552, it had bought the fleeing fleet enough time to escape the pursuing Covenant forces. file:HOC_last_stand.png Category:Cruisers Category:Individual Ships Category:Individual UNSC Ships